And the angel said unto him, Gird thyself, and bind on thy sandals. And so he did. And he saith unto him, Cast thy garment about thee, and follow me. And he went out, and followed him; and wist not that it was true which was done by the angel;* but thought he saw a vision.
When they were past the first and the second ward,* they came unto the iron gate that leadeth unto the city; which opened to them of his own accord: and they went out, and passed on through one street; and forthwith the angel departed from him.
And when Peter was come to himself, he said, Now I know of a surety, that the Lord hath sent his angel, and hath delivered me out of the hand of Herod, and from all the expectation of the people of the Jews.
And when he had considered the thing, he came to the house of Mary* the mother of John, whose surname was Mark;* where many were gathered together praying.
* This line means: “he did not realise that what the angel did was actually happening”. ‘Wist’ (knew, realised) is a past tense of the now obsolete English verb ‘wot’ (know, realise). The verb ‘wot’ occurs quite frequently in the Authorised Version.
* In addition to setting all those guards, Herod had ordered that St Peter be kept deep in the heart of the jail.
* This is the only time that this Mary is mentioned — unless of course she is identified with any of the other women named Mary in the New Testament.
* John Mark is generally reckoned to be the author of the second Gospel, which bears his name. Luke tells us that Mark was an associate of St Paul, but had left St Paul’s company by the time Luke joined it (Luke starts telling his tale with ‘we’ and ‘us’ from Acts 16). Tradition adds that St Mark toured various cities with St Peter, and was especially associated with Alexandria in Egypt.